H.S. football notebook: Let there be light at Windham

In 1982, the Windham High School boosters club employed Musco Lighting to illuminate the football field. At the time, the cost was $96,000 for the lights. That didn’t count the installation which, fortunately, was accomplished somewhat with in-kind services. ...

By Staff reports

The Bulletin

By Staff reports

Posted Sep. 30, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Sep 30, 2013 at 12:16 PM

By Staff reports

Posted Sep. 30, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Sep 30, 2013 at 12:16 PM

In 1982, the Windham High School boosters club employed Musco Lighting to illuminate the football field. At the time, the cost was $96,000 for the lights. That didn’t count the installation which, fortunately, was accomplished somewhat with in-kind services.

“When we got everything in and everything was done, we put a quarter on the 50-yard line and you could stand in the press box and see that quarter,” Dan Chace, the president of the Boosters Club at the time, said.

If you wanted to see that quarter now, it would have to be one big quarter.

The lights that now surround Ferrigno Field are generally regarded to provide some of the worst lighting in the Eastern Connecticut Conference.

It’s not the age of the system, according to athletic manager Pat Risley, it’s the bulbs that are now in place.

According to Risley, about five or six years ago, the school received a conservation grant for new energy-efficient lighting. Even though that grant was not supposed to include the field lighting, according to Risley, the change was made.

“I was young on the job and they told me they had to change the lights and I

was like, OK, change the lights,” Risley said. “It was noticeable the very first year we put the lights on with those energy-efficient bulbs. We just dealt with it.”

He said he did raise the issue, but was told for the school to keep the grant, the lights had to be kept in place. Risley said he’s looking into whether or not that is still the case.

Chace said he recently sat down with the new head of maintenance at Windham High.

“He wants to come and see what we’re talking about, because he didn’t realize there’s a problem,” Chace said.

Risley said the first thing that will be investigated is whether the lighting is appropriate as far as luminence and candlepower.

“We will be testing that soon to see what we’re putting out in the center of the field,” Risley said.

A night to remember

There was plenty of hugging going on after Montville running back Jeremiah Crowley’s record-setting performance on Friday night against Stonington.

Crowley had just rushed for 526 yards and seven touchdowns and just prior to the end of the game was embraced by coach Tanner Grove. Then came his mom and the team to offer their congratulations after the final horn blew. There was one person missing, however: Crowley’s father, Thomas, who passed away when he was a freshman.

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“Every time I step on to this field, I think of him,” Crowley said with tears welling up in his eyes. “I know he never wants me to give up on my team or anything. He wants me to play 100 percent no matter what.”

It has not been an easy ride for the Norwich native. Although tremendously talented on the field, he has had his share of hurdles to clear off of it. Even this year, he was suspended for Montville’s first game and some of the second due to an emotional outburst at a preseason jamboree.

“The kid is good at a lot of things, but the things that he has always struggled with, people let him know about at every level of his life,” Grove said. “School teachers, people around town, and it’s been a struggle for him. He was by no means the dream student or the dream athlete, but I would tell you what, after his time served (the suspension), he came to me and said he was going to do everything in his power to play the right way, within the rules, with his teammates. That moment for me is why I coach football.”

Changing the routine

Ledyard’s offense displayed its ability to break the big play against its first two opponents, RHAM and Bacon Academy. The only problem the Colonels had was their machine-like offense seemed to take a couple quarters to warm up. They trailed near the half before dropping 29 third-quarter points on Sept. 20 against Bacon Academy.

In preparing for Killingly last week, Ledyard coach Jim Buonocore experimented to try and end the developing trend.

“We did some things in practice where we switched up the routine,” Buonocore said. “Typically, a practice schedule will go from stretch, agility to individual to group to team. Well, we thought if we came out of the locker room and started working group team stuff and do fast and furious right away (it will) get them focused about being ready initially.”

The tactic paid off on Friday against the Redmen. The Colonels scored touchdowns on each of their first three drives, and thanks to an added 74-yard kick return touchdown from Khary Childs, led 28-6 by the end of the first quarter.

Part of what kept Ledyard off the scoreboard early in the first two weeks was careless mistakes. Buonocore said he saw a lot less of those in Friday’s 55-14 win, but they still have work to do. Running back JoJo Shumaker, who ran for three of those first-quarter scores (four total) seemed to agree.

“I don’t think any team can compete with us, but lately we’ve just been hurting ourselves — turnovers, missing assignments, the linemen with assignments and doing what they need to do,” Shumaker said about the first two weeks. “If everyone does his job, we should be able to win a lot of games.”

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Calculated risk

About a minute after NFA took the lead for good on Friday night against Fitch, Falcons coach Jordan Panucci took a calculated risk.

Facing 4th-and-5 from his own 39-yard line, Panucci called for a fake punt.

Fitch’s punter Devante Anderson — who quarterbacked Fitch to the Class L playoffs last season — took the snap, and his pass to Quartney Parker was nearly complete.

The move didn’t backfire, as Fitch forced NFA to turn the ball over on downs, but it showed that Panucci, in his first head coaching gig, isn’t afraid to make a bold call.

“You’re in a position where you need to make a big play and capture that momentum back,” said Panucci, whose team gave the No. 4 Wildcats all they could handle until late in the fourth quarter. “That’s a point where you can do that, where you can take control of the game and put wind back in your sails. That’s what we were trying to do. You have to pull out all the stops.”

The Falcons are 1-2, but their losses came to perennial Rhode Island power LaSalle and NFA, a Class LL finalist a year ago.

“We’re growing exponentially each week,” Panucci said. “We have some smart players. They do things the right way and they do what they’re told. That can be a rarity. You have to remember they’re teenagers, but they do things the right way the first time we tell them.”

The benefits of rest

One benefit — perhaps the only one — from playing your starters just over a quarter in a season-opening win in Week 2, is the ability to get your backups a lot of reps.

In the case of NFA, those reps came in handy while both Marcus Outlow and Khlaeed Exum-Strong were banged up for much of Friday’s win over Fitch.

NFA coach Jemal Davis said he doesn’t worry about being a week behind other teams, or about his marquee backs getting banged up.

“I don’t get worried about that because we have guys that we can put in there,” Davis said. “Airec Ricks (45 yards rushing) came in there at the end and did an outstanding job. Ramel (Williams, two touchdowns), Calvin Green is another guy we were able to put in there. We’ve been able to give guys a lot of reps. The thing we need to be able to do as a team is play consistently, so if one guy is cramping up or has an injury we’re still going to be consistent because those guys are as exploisve.”

Outlow estimated he was about 75 percent after coming down awkwardly on his ankle in the first half. He finished with 138 yards — 99 in the second half — and two TDs despite clearly favoring his ankle.

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“He was hobbling,” Davis said of Outlow. “But we just felt at that point that he needed to get a game underneath him. He felt he could go and he did a nice job hobbling around.”

Gustafson finished with 71 yards on 13 carries in a 42-35 win over Bacon Academy on Saturday, but it was his 11-yard interception return for a touchdown that stopped any chance of a Bacon score in the fourth quarter that put Waterford momentarily in front, 35-28. He later added a second interception late in the quarter that effectively killed the Bobcats’ chances of another comeback.

“Once he makes his read, he’s going. He knows where it is,” coach Mike Ellis said. “He’s not indecisive, and he knows where to go. He brings it all. He brings his shoulder square, deliver the hit in the hole, (in a) pass-dropping back, getting underneath the receivers, he has an understanding of where to be. He’s developing into a complete linebacker.”

Hoagland said if he ever needs a short gain on offense, he knows who he wants to have the ball.

“I know he’ll just barrel through whoever is in his way,” he said.

Nice combo

Bacon’s Ryan Duclos and Nate Kozlowski have been playing together ever since their freshman year.

So it’s pretty clear the chemistry they have despite losing to Waterford.

Kozlowski threw for 353 yards — 215 went to Duclos — and Duclos caught two of Kozlowski’s three touchdowns.

“I have a lot of reps with him, so I have this connection with him,” Duclos said. “He just the puts the ball up and he gets it to me every single time.”

Of all the things on which coach Erik Larka can count, that quarterback-receiver duo is one of the tops.

“Ryan has got to be one of the best receivers in the state, and definitely one of the best in the ECC,” Larka said. “It’s awesome.”